Personally I like the NFL not a big fan of the CFL ( yuck, yuck, yuck..)

I shoulda said "C4L".....

When I bought that ticket yesterday, I didn't have my glasses with me. So I just winged it with a blurry betslip in front of me. I was amazed it went thru the terminal OK. But when I looked at the ticket, I immediately thought "This aint right." I was trying to play #43 but actually played #42. Maybe I'll hit it big tonite.

I can see the newspaper headlines now: "Blind Old Fool Cashes in Big".G5

Does anyone even pay attention to blind old fools?

About playing the lottery -- You will lose more than you win. Until you hit a jackpot. Then everything changes!

I was never much of a C4L Player. That's because up until now, there wasn't much history of the game that could be studied so as to see how the numbers behave. But last nite was the 230th drawing since June 16, 2014 and now there's more than enough history to see a few things.

So here's a few things I've noticed about The Cashball;

The #2 Cashball is the biggest hitter with 67 hits over the life of the game. #3 is second with 57 hits and the #1 and 4 Cashballs are close behind #3 with 54 and 52 hits respectively.

The #2 Cashball likes to repeat. It's repeated 10 times, double repeated 4 times and has even triple repeated once. (The #1 Cashball has also triple repeated. The #1 and #2 Cashballs triple repeated within a month of each other in March and April of this year.) So if you see a Cashball has been drawn in three consecutive drawings, don't play it.

The #2 Cashball is a huge one-skipper. So if it came out on Monday, look for it again the following Monday. But you'd also be OK if you played it the drawing after it came out too.

As I see more behavioral characteristics of the game, I'll post them here. I gotta study the non-Cashball numbers some more. G5

About playing the lottery -- You will lose more than you win. Until you hit a jackpot. Then everything changes!

With a draw history of only 230 draws, I don't see some of the kinds of things in C4L that can be seen with NY's Take5. (7,083 Take5 drawings have been held since January 1992)

I downloaded an Excel file from a State of New York website that had all 230 C4L drawings in it. I then sorted it in ascending order so I could get a look at the numbers from the lowest set of five numbers ever drawn (1 2 14 29 59) to the highest set ever drawn. (46 50 56 57 58)

Only twice have four numbers been drawn from the same number group. (20 22 26 27 43 and 46 50 56 57 58) Never has there been a drawing where all five non-cashball numbers came from the same number group. Actually, I was surprised I found two drawings with four numbers from the same group. There have been many times when three numbers were drawn from the same number group.

C4L is a tough tough game!! It's got a "coverage problem" too. Just like it's predecessor, SweetMillion, NY players don't like the game. So they vote with their dollars, and spend those dollars on other online or scratch off games. A coverage problem simply means they don't sell an adequate enough number of five number combo's (plus the Cashball) to make it likely somebody will win a jackpot. That's why when you check The NY Lottery's website, you see "Zero winners of the jackpot" for practically all of the drawings. And... they sell C4L in other states too, but still there aren't enough combo's sold to make it likely somebody will win a JP in any state. My guess as to why players don't like the game is due to the crummy lower tier prize payouts.

What I've typically been doing when I do play C4L (which hasn't been a lot) is I play the #2 or 3 CashBall, and do a partial QP for the five numbers. I use a power number like #4, let the terminal pick the others, and hope for the best. G5

About playing the lottery -- You will lose more than you win. Until you hit a jackpot. Then everything changes!

C4L isn't too popular among players, so I don't know if what I'm about to write will be of much interest to anybody.... But here goes anyway.

I took a look at the way C4L's numbers skip, and was surprised to see something. In NY's Take5 one skips rule, but that's NOT the case with C4L. Instead, over the life of the game, (minus the Cashball) five skips happen most often. Four skips are the second most commonly occurring skip.

As of last Thursday nite, there are two numbers that have skipped the last five drawings: #4 and #23.

There are currently five numbers that have skipped the last four drawings: #'s 3 34 44 53 & 55.

There has not been a five skip since July 28th (a five skip might be over due), so I'm gonna play #4 and #23 tomorrow nite and see what happens. Since July 28th, four skips have popped three times, so I'll also probably play a four skip or two. G5

About playing the lottery -- You will lose more than you win. Until you hit a jackpot. Then everything changes!

Only #24 fell into my method of choosing numbers that have skipped 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 drawings.

My "method" (if it can be called a method) comes from something a buddy of mine once told me. He said "If you want to know tonite's numbers, then just look in the last four drawings. You'll see 'em."

I wondered Just how true that statement really is or isn't, so I did a little math and here's what I came up with;

There have been 230 C4L drawings since the game began on June 16, 2014. So that means a total of 1,150 non-Cashball numbers/balls have been drawn.

My copy of Advantage Plus software tells me that of the 1, 2, 3, 4 & 5 skips (non-cashballs only, or excluding Cashballs) there have been 78 one-skips, 65 two-skips, 60 three-skips, 75 four-skips, and 81 five-skips since 6/16/14. That totals up to 359. Dividing 359 by 1,150 gives me a percentage of 31.22% of all skips were in those 5 categories.

Why C4L numbers like to four and five skip is a mystery to me! NY's Take5 is where one-skips rule. I didn't calculate it, but I can tell you that 35 to 36 percent of all numbers drawn since Take5 began back in January of 1992 were 1, 2 3 or 4 skips. Anyway, Good Luck to you tonite Haymaker!! I've no idea how my "method" will do tonite. It's just something I'm experimenting with. G5

About playing the lottery -- You will lose more than you win. Until you hit a jackpot. Then everything changes!

Another crazy thing about C4L is the total number of New York winners. It's all over the place.

Looking back at various draws, I would have thought that I'd have seen approximately the same total number of NY winners week in, week out listed on The New York Lottery's website. Not the case at all! Many weeks you'll see approximately 50,000 winners, but there were weeks where there were upwards of 63,000 winners. I cant imagine what would cause a spike up like that. G5

About playing the lottery -- You will lose more than you win. Until you hit a jackpot. Then everything changes!